But this is Massachusetts, where we don’t care about no stinking calendar.

So the day began with our yard threatening to “green up,” the grass nearly bare of snow.

While making breakfast, I snapped this shot of deer grazing out past our slumbering garden:

…taken through an unfortunately filthy window, as Winter tends to render them before a real Spring cleaning. I didn’t have the proper lens on hand, so this is a severe crop of a larger photo. All-in-all, I’m satisfied with the result.

I spent the bulk of the day loading split wood onto the porch in anticipation of the predicted winter storm, then bombed off to Berkshire county to deliver a framed photo to my friend Tim. I was pleased by his reception of the piece and humbled by his refusal of the Good Friend Discount.

Thanks, Tim. I’ll remember that.

On the way home the weather caught up to me, and by the time I hit Charlemont it was snowing:

We’re expecting 10″ or more, and judging by the way it’s coming down, we might not be disappointed!

My housemates went up to the Maine Coast this weekend for some night photography, reminding me that it was a New Moon ’round about tonight and tomorrow night.

Well, I can’t get away, but thought I’d find something closer to home which might make a suitable subject for taking advantage of a clear, moonless night.

I headed up into the hills to get away from cities, towns and highways, but you know, there’s nowhere really, really dark in Massachusetts. The best I could manage was to get to a high meadow in the hills, find something worth shooting and work with the ambient light.

I settled on the Doane Cemetery in Hawley, beautifully situated on a dome of farmland off of Forget Road. The faint glow of distant Pittsfield tainted the horizon, and I knew that with a long exposure to get the stars, it would be a compositional element. So I looked for a foreground element with enough presence to stand up to the background light.

I settled on a tall monument, which I lit with about five seconds of “light painting” from a small LED flashlight. It was a bit clumsily done, but with the camera a foot off the snow, evaluating the image meant laying in the wet snow, which I could only do a couple of times before I was soaked and had to call it a night.

Next time, it’s full gear and a foam pad for this old boy!

Anyway, here’s the best of several images – taken with a 16mm lens, ISO 6400, f/8, 30″ exposure:

I was surprised at how little of the sky I got with my 16mm lens; seems to me it looked somewhat grander when I last took night shots up at Acadia National Park in Maine this past autumn.

Oh well, I like the image anyway, and without buying a wider lens, that’ll have to be good enough! 😉

I just “finished” installing a show of my landscape photography at the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce in Amherst, MA.

I put “finished” in quotation marks because I hung the photos, but expect to be back for a second look at their arrangement, and may yet move things around. I also have a lot of work to do on labeling and leveling and creating informational pages before the official opening on Thursday, March 7th as part of the monthly Amherst Art Walk.

I’m thrilled to be part of this event, as it puts a slice of my work in front of a whole new (and larger) set of hearts and eyeballs.

Here’s how the layout looked when I left it tonight, subject to minor changes before Thursday:

I’d be pleased to see any of you who are “local” at this event, and urge you to stop by as you wander about town (there are several nice Actual Galleries in the immediate vicinity, so you’ll get to see a lot without walking a lot.)